We simply loved our daily poetry time last year. We focused on one poem for the entire week. So… how do you keep 5 days worth of shared reading fun and meaningful… let me show you!
Mondays
We read and “act out” our poem. In this photo, we were looking for word wall words.
We add the poem to our poetry notebook and circle our word wall words.
Tuesday
We read and “act out” our poem. This particular week we thought of rhyming words and looked for vowels.
Wednesday
We read and “act out” our poem. We completed a related sort
and added it to our interactive notebook.
Thursday
We read and “act out” our poem. We complete another related sort for our interactive notebook.
Friday
We read and “act out” our poem. We would roam around the school and sing to our faculty (bless them for looking excited when we stopped by.) Here is a little video of us preparing.
AND/OR
Students color an emergent reader that matches the poem. (not pictured… #fail).
AND/OR
Students would perform the poem via Chatterpix. This cool app is super easy to use and the file can be saved and emailed to parents.
After the week is over, the poems are moved into an early finisher’s bin. The students love putting their past favorites into order.
And they have their poetry notebook to look back on if need be.
What does the research say?
I have shown you HOW, but here is the WHY!
“if children can sing or recite poetry, they will soon be able to read it, and if they can read it, they will soon be able to write it.” Parr, M., & Campbell, T. (2006). Poets in practice. The Reading Teacher, 60(1), 36-46.
“Poetry
is the first genre that most children hear Poetry isn’t just whimsical but contributes to increasing reading abilities. Lower primary teachers use nursery rhymes to develop phonemic awareness and one-to-one correspondence, and poetry helps children of all ages develop vocabulary. Reading poetry aloud over and over creates fluency with expression.” Manning, M. (2003). A poetic awakening. Teaching PreK-8, 33(5), 85-87.
You can find these poems by following the links below. I have two sets since some teachers have looped with their class and they wanted to have a new set of poems:
- Kindergarten: Poetry Unit, Songs, Videos, and Interactive Notebook
- Kindergarten or First Grade: Poetry Unit, Songs, Videos, and Interactive Notebook
Read more about Poetry in these links:
5 Comments
[…] have written extensively about how we use poetry to influence fluency. You can read that post HERE. But here are a few more words from Fountas and […]
[…] We love our poetry time! Each week we start a new poem. We practice it for fluency and also work on a plethora of literacy skills. You can read more about my 5 day fluency plan HERE. […]
Hi! I have purchased your poetry bundle and I am loving it. Can I purchase the QR codes separately ?
Thank you!
Yes! The QR codes are included in the music and video files 🙂
[…] You can read a post on how I take a poem and use it over the course of 5 days to build fluency. You can see that post HERE. […]